Cultural Analysis Of Two English Versions Of The Peony Pavilion

The Peony Pavilion is a well-known classical Chinese legend play. Its plot, theme and language became popular as soon as it went on stage. In the past four centuries, The Peony Pavilion has moved numerous young women to tears. For example, when Feng Xiaoqing, a girl in Guilin died in melancholy, she left a poem behind her:"I hate to face the rain with windows so damp, but I enjoy reading The Peony Pavilion under the lamp. There must be people as crazy as me. Xiaoqing is not the only one you can see."Such a masterpiece should be introduced to the world.According to the Skopostheorie (the theory that applies the notion of Skopos to translation), the prime principle determining any translation process is the Skopos (purpose) of the overall translational action. The Skopos determines the translation methods and strategies that are to be employed in order to produce a functionally adequate target text. Within the framework of the Skopostheorie, adequacy rather than equivalence is the assessment criterion for the target text. This thesis tries to probe into the cultural translation of The Peony Pavilion from the perspective of Skopostheorie, and discusses how the Skopos in a translational action influences the translators'choice of the translation methods and strategies, and what effects are achieved. The author finds that guided by different Skoposi, translators of the two English Versions of The Peony Pavilion, have produced different target texts. However, the translators'respective Skoposi in the translational action justifies both target texts. In this thesis, efforts are made to attract the attention to the study of the Skopos in the process of translation and introduce an adequacy-centered assessment criterion.Since The Peony Pavilion was written in the Ming Dynasty, modern Chinese readers may have difficulty in understanding the highly condensed language (especially the verse part), not to mention the foreigners. There are inevitably many allusions and connotations that cannot be appreciated due to entirely different cultural and historical backgrounds. So what is most crucial for a translator is to enable the translation to function in the way people want it to function. Only in this way can readers obtain a true and all-round understanding of our great and glorious culture.